Fifth Floor is pleased to present, Second Life, an exhibition of sustainably designed furniture and objects made by the noted L.A. based designer/maker, William Stranger. His newest work will include a series of his Fragment Vases made from reclaimed pieces of selected hardwoods, a Fragments Mirror installation that will playfully nestle itself into the gallery’s architecture and other masterfully crafted furniture pieces. The largest pieces in the exhibition are created from the reclaimed lanes of the defunct, Tava Lanes bowling alley. The bowling lanes have been transformed into two commanding wall hangings and also a modern floor-hugging coffee table. Stranger’s unique pieces bring a new, second life, to salvaged wood with a rich history that would have been otherwise lost to the scrap heap.

Stranger’s wooden furniture pieces and objects culminate in the juxtaposition of clean and modern rectilinear lines with organic forms provided by the living history of the materials he chooses. His primary source of material is urban salvage; trees that are blown over or cut down due to disease or construction are milled on site or at the arborist’s yard. The process allows for the use of unique local wood that would otherwise be wasted and also keeps trees out of the landfill. Each piece is a unique object in which the wood is carefully chosen and worked to reveal the individual nature of each contributing material.

William Stranger’s Monolith Bench won best design at Good Wood: Furniture and Objects from Sustainable Materials at the Pasadena Museum of California Art in 2005. In 2007 Stranger’s Light (gets in) line was shown at HauteGREEN, a curated exhibition of sustainable furniture in the New York City design week and in the Sustainable Furniture Council’s Greenhouse Gallery at the Las Vegas Market. His furniture has also been exhibited at Altbuild, CaBoom, Dwell on Design, and in environmentally themed shows at the Gallery of Functional Art, Trios Gallery, and LivinGreen. In 2008 Second Growth, a solo show of Stranger’s work, opened at the Pasadena Museum of California Art. In 2009 the Tava Lanes coffee table, made of salvaged bowling alley lanes, won an honorable mention at the Design Within Reach M+D+F competition. Stranger’s Furniture has been published in the New York Times, the LA Times, Dwell, Interior Design, Luxe, Flaunt Magazine, Italian Glamour, Western Interiors and Design, California Home and Design, Los Angeles Magazine, and C Magazine.